J. Celeste Lay, a professor of political science at Tulane University, reviewed the results of the Recovery School District—which replaced all public schools with privately-managed charter schools—and concluded that the story of “the Néw Orleans miracle” is a Big Lie.
She writes:
“The Louisiana Department of Education’s recent release of the results of the LEAP and iLEAP testing is incontrovertible evidence that the “grand experiment” of the charter system in New Orleans has failed. The New Orleans Recovery School District comes in at the 17th percentile in the state in its percentage of students at the basic level and above. The RSD has no A-rated schools and few B schools. By the state’s post-Katrina definition of a failing school, nine years into the experiment, nearly all of the schools in the RSD are “failing.” Communities around the state that are grappling with their own public education challenges should look at New Orleans’ charter schools experience with skepticism.”
Read her description of how the choice system sorts students.
And she adds:
“It doesn’t matter that with all this choice, most kids in New Orleans have no greater educational opportunities than before. The focus on choice as opposed to results also obscures the fact that certain groups have profited substantially in the post-Katrina system.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
http://www.dallasnews.com/news/politics/local-politics/20140621-joyce-foreman-defeats-well-funded-challenger-in-dallas-isd-trustee-runoff.ece
Did not know where to leave this: hopeful community pushback against Dallas’ heinous Broad sup:)
This study by J. Celeste Lay should be mandatory reading for Chris Christie and Christie hand picked superintendents in Newark, Camden and other NJ cities. CC wants to do to NJ what was done to New Orleans. NCLB was a failure, the New Orleans “experiment” is a failure and RTTT is an abomination.
The CHOICE movement has always been and always will be about the money—the profits to be made—and never about the children. The CHOICE promise has failed for more than twenty years and is still failing repeatedly from coast to coast. The private sector CHOICE option in place of public schools is riddled with fraud and performs, on average, horrible when compared to public schools.
The systematic destruction of the public schools to make a profit for corporations and increase the wealth and power of billionaires must end. The CHOICE movement is a terminal cancer that will eat America’s democracy and spit it out.
I am appreciative that Governor Jindal is finally trying to dismantle the machine that he has helped create. This video will show you how New Orleans became an all charter area and why you need to be concerned that all will eventually turn into all charter districts. Chas Roemer, BESE president is brother to Mrs. Roemer Shirley who is the president of the LA Charter Schools, Kira Orange Jones, BESE member, is TFA, Curt Eysink head of LA Workforce Commission sits on the LA Charter School Board, Paul Pastorek is coming back to do who knows what. We all know the destruction John White has heaped onto the state being TFA and Broad. Where will this all end? They want all charters. I hope Governor Jindal will be able to correct all that is wrong in Louisiana. http://vimeo.com/97774578
Click to access RSDClosingOpeningChangingCodes.pdf
Read this report by Research on Reforms. Describes how NOLA Charter schools closed and reopened under different names so their scores would disappear. Only to reopen under a new name, but same failing school. All in an effort to hide the real number of failing charter schools in New Orleans. So the failiure rate is actually worse than what the numbers show. Confederacy of Dunces….
I guess many people are gaining an increasing awareness of the problem with NOLA choice experiment since the fallout between governor Bobby Jindal and John White.
let’s see how long she gets to stay at tulane…
Unfortunately, there are winners and losers in the situation. The winners have profited financially and the losers are the students and the teachers who work hard. We have to ask ourselves what it really takes to reform a school. The focus in this situation seems to be on the test scores. Are test scores the only indicator in whether or not a school has succeeded or failed? There are more components involved in making a great school. How about high quality professional development for the teachers and an assessment system that takes into account the complexity of various teaching and learning situations? According to Patricia Hinchey these are the most important variables in success for the students, which nobody seems to be concerned about. This “experiment” was at the risk of the students.
I hate to discuss the politics, but would a politician who is opposed to privatization please stand up? The people in the community can’t make a decision when both parties are for privatization! Want to talk about choice? How about giving the people a choice!
President of Tulane was just on Tavis Smiley extolling civil society’s involvement in the successful rebuilding of the New Orleans Schools. He said civil society because the correct words, capitalists or corporations, must not be polling well. Just like civil rights is used in discussions of the Vergara case. Disappointing that Mr. Smiley did not think to challenge him.